Etymologies

Examples

Jamelia herself was brought up by a single mother, Paulette Davis, who became pregnant with her as a teenager, so she sees all the issues from the perspective of a second-generation single mother and believes that her dysfunctional relationships with her children's fathers were due to her own fatherless childhood.

Grandparents look after the children a lot because Jamaicans are very family-oriented, says Jamelia, who still lives outside Birmingham partly so that family members, as well as friends, can get involved in looking after her children.

The unrelenting work ethic in such institutions was a lingering relic of the workhouses, where Romford-based Bill Golding – also interviewed by Jamelia in the programme – was sent at the age of three with his unmarried mother Ida, in 1924, after her family rejected her.

Jamelia's discovery of how bad the past was for single mothers has made her resolve to step up the pastoral side of a career that already involves going into schools to talk to girls about their potential.